Normal maps info? Anyone? Anywhere?
murph101
Posts: 68
Can anyone direct me to any documentation on the use of Normal Maps in Carrara?
I am in a digital art class and we did a section on Normal Maps, AO, Highlight, and other things related to PBR. While interesting and impressive, I don't see it as applicable in Carrara. I recall seeing the terms come up in other posts, but didn't know what they were at the time. So I suspect that they come into play somewhere in Carrara's realm.
I've done searches and a zillion posts come up, but nothing that indicates how I can apply this new knowledge.
Any pointers would be appreciated.
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In C8 and above, Normal maps can be used in the Bump channel by using a pulldown menu. It should work as in other programs.
Exporting Normal maps may require a plugin. Baker seems to come to mind.
EP, you speak about the Baker plugin, where can we find it ?
I have an exemple here and I dream to do that, is it the same plugin ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8nx-HNZkEdg
I don't know who makes it off hand as I don't have it. I have just read about its capabilities.
You might find it at the Carrara Cafe under the list of plugins.
this might be of interest http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/4371/
HI murph101
Normal maps can be used in Carrara,. You can also use Bump maps and Displacement maps,.
All of these maps are used to add depth detail to an objects surface.
Normal maps use the objects surface "Normals" direction (The face of an object which is pointing out towards the camera)
they are RGB images and can contain high details.
In Carrara's shader room, you would select the Bump channel of a shader, and select Normal map from the options list, then select your Image from a folder. (See pic)
Bump maps use 256 levels of Grey-scale (Black and white)
Both Bump and Normal maps are used to create a "Lighting effect" of shadows to give the illusion of detail.
Displacement maps are usually Grey-scale images which are used to physically alter the shape of a surface by subdividing it and using the White / Black information from the Image, to deform the objects surface
Carrara doesn't have a Built in "Normal map" exporter,. to create your own normal maps,.
Inagoni has a plug-in called "Baker" which allows you to export the texture maps for any object
this can also create and export Normal maps
http://www.inagoni.com/e107_plugins/content/content.php?content.3
hope that helps
Thank you for these links.
It is already an interesting plugin but I wonder how DimensionTheory made to animate this surface.
Is Baker able to export a footage ?
Just to clarify...
I know Andy is very familiar with surface normals, but I thought I'd clarify a bit on his description of what they signify.
A normal isn't really related to "pointing out towards the camera".
A normal is nothing more than an arrow that is perpendicular to each polygon/face/facet of an object. In fact, the definition of "normal" is "perpendicular to". It describes what direction the polygon/face/facet is pointing in 3D space. It's a bit like taking a square piece of cardboard and sticking one of those arrows with a suction cup on the cardboard. And when you pick up the cardboard and move it around, the arrow is always pointing in the direction that the cardboard is facing.
Why is that useful? Well, if you can describe in x, y, and z coordinates where the arrow is facing (basically the XYZ coordinates of the tip of the arrow), you always know the orientation of the surface at every point on the surface. And that can be very useful in many situations, including being able to simulate bumpiness in the surface.
So you take the x value of the XYZ coordinates for each and every facet of the object, you can convert those values into a grayscale image which defines all the X coordinates. The do the same for the Y and Z values, and you have three grayscale images which define the surface normals.
The attached image shows the normal vectors for a simple low poly sphere.
And attached are the corresponding X, Y, and Z normals grayscale images for the same object.
Note that the more the facet faces in, say, the X direction, the whiter that pixel is in the X normal grayscale. So, for example, a normal ("arrow") pointing only in the +X direction, for example, would have XYZ coordinates of (255, 0, 0), which is converted to fully white in the X normal map image.
I'm guessing that "Baker" had little to do with the sim that was posted. I'm guessing it was a fairly simple case of using a real fluid sim application to get the fluid "wake" effect, and then converting those surface animations to a baked normal map sequence which was then used in Carrara to get the animation.
Which begs the question...why even bother with Carrara, why not just render in Blender (or whatever was used for the fluids)...
Thanks for your answer, Joe.
I'm workind hard to learn RF but the only pipeline to Carrara is the DCG Obj. Seq. Exporter and this conversion in meshes don't give really good results (for the moment).
I think to pass by the Maxwell render included in RF and then, compositing...
Is it a native feature of Blender or a plugin for RF (like in c4d) ?
I don't think you need to go to a full fluid sim for what he did. There's a super cool and super simple feature of a different, free, 3D app that I won't mention because some people feel this is only a Carrara forum and they tend to get upset when someone discusses a different app.
Anyway, there is a feature called dynamic paint, with a "wave" feature, where you define an object as a "brush", and another object as a "canvas" (if memory serves me right now), and you move the brush object (in this case a sphere) along the surface of the Canvas (in this case a subdiv plane), and in real time you get reflecting and refracting surface waves and wakes and stuff. It's been around for ages, but nontheless it's a super cool feature that unfortunately doesn't exist in Carrara.
It takes all of 10 minutes to set up in this other app. Which is free. :) :)
Anyway, I apologize for mentioning the existence of another app with cool features in this forum. I know it's wrong. But I'm just trying to be helpful.
Forgive the poor quality, but I did a very hasty animation of the dynamic paint feature I was discussing. It should get the point across. You just keyframe the sphere object, moving across the subdiv plane, and the dynamic paint feature generates all the waves and reflections and wakes and stuff.
DT's animation was done before Carrara had the ability to load Normal maps,. hence the use of Baker to load an animated sequence, the original animated waves effect was done in After effects. As far as I remember. (something like the radio waves effect with reflection enabled, and an animated source point
The Surface normal direction has NOTHING to do with arrows,. those are a "graphical indication" which allows the user to quickly view the direction which the objects surface normal is facing..
Sometimes by trying to offer a more convoluted explanation of something quite simple, it's possible to offer over elaborate and potentially misguiding or confusing instructions. to explain in intricate detail, what has already been explained simply.
I just love this guy... :) :)
He, interesting little program.
I had almost arrived at this result with a soft body plane attached and a rigid plan just in lower part, but this one is better.
if you're worried about Chohole, you can post the infos about this software here (or PM me if you are really afraid :-)): http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/6274/
I wouldn't worry about it. People pick on Joe because he has very strongly held beliefs and likes to express them. Sort of like me and The Millennium Cow (C'Mon DAZ - we're All STILL waiting!!). He always wants people to do crazy things like look at the real world for ideas, or use more than one piece of software to get a job done.
He's OK, just a bit ... forthright?
The software is probably Blender. I would use Blender for more than a mere file converter if I could ever wrap my tiny little brain around it's interface, but it hurts me to try and my brain is very fragile so I limit what I do with software that has too steep a learning curve for what my free time allows.
Everyone should give Blender a try, but if you are put off by it's interface, it will be a hard program to learn. That's why I like Cowrarra. It was easy for me to learn and was made specifically for rendering Cows (as it's name implies).
That's all I need in a 3D Program.
Blender was made more for rendering food items like milkshakes and smoothies (as it's name implies!).
Of course, all my advice should be taken with a pillar of salt since my brain is made entirely out of wood. So maybe that was all nonsense...
Hey Joe - what does that dynamic paint feature do if you start the "brush" under the "canvas" and raise it up through the target? Would it "splash" or just deform and snap back, or something else entirely (like fail or object to rampant silliness)?
Yes it is Blender. And no, I don't really care if people find excuses to discredit me (like complaining if I discuss some non-Carrara software or some other totally useless and silly complaint), so I'll gladly provide more info on the feature.
The feature is Blender's Dynamic Paint. Yes, Blender also has a very very nice fluid sim, but for what was referenced the dynamic paint feature should work fine.
Yes, it also simulates the splash from something falling into the water. It's really quite impressive for a free app. And it does all of this in real time, so as you move your sphere object you get realtime splashes and ripples.
Another very useful application of this is to use it to simulate the wake of a boat. Just make your brush object the shape of the boat's hull and voila, you can simulate a boat wake. You could even render your boat anim in Carrara, then composite onto the wake anim from Blender.
Really, the process is extremely simple. Just add a plane object and subdivide it. Then add your "disturbance" object. Set the plane object as a dynamic paint "canvas", and choose the "waves" feature. Then set the disturbance object as a dynamic paint "brush". Run the sim, and move the disturber in real time and watch the ripples.
Oh, and since I'm sure someone will now complain because I didn't specifically tie my comments into the thread title, you can then take the deformation of your subdivided plane (used as the water surface), and extract that deformation data as a normal map animation (or other type of deformation anim).